jacob wrote: ↑Sat Mar 16, 2019 3:18 am
... is as far as I'm concerned an emergent quality of its participants. Over the years (it's been almost 10 now), the emergent political atmosphere on the forum has swung right, then left, then right again. The gender pendulum has also swung back and forth. Mostly, though, gender didn´t use to be an issue and as such the gender lens is relatively new. People didn't use to identify on the forum by gender(*). Often I/we didn´t even know and it didn´t matter. Whereas in 2017-2019 it matters so much that it seems to determine almost everything. But this too shall pass ...
(*) Which sometimes caused some surprises at meetups.
The problem with emergence is that it tends to trend as a new "atmosphere" gains momentum. People who like the new atmosphere feel encouraged to post more. People, who don't, post less and begin to lurk or leave outright. Fundamentally the atmosphere, whether it welcomes this idea or that idea, is a product of the community. When select people stop participating, of course it changes. Another effect of this [lack of mean reversion] is that the system tends towards bistability. This means that it can flip instantly based on a single event or discussion thread.
I posit that when forums (such as this one) are unmoderated wrt sentiment, they converge on monochrome states according to the prevailing societal lenses that people apply. For example, there are two large FIRE groups in Denmark on facebook. One is 95% male and the other is 95% female. I have never observed any genderism fights in either... it's just that most people post where they think they'll be welcome according to their lens---which is now gender. Ironically, when it comes to gender stuff, both groups internally complain about the dearth of members of the opposite sex, not realizing that their combined choices created the emergent gender sorting effect. (I'm a member of both groups, so I can see the meta-dynamics.)
My priority is not making this forum more welcoming according to whatever lens is trending in general society. Basically, what I want to promote here is intellectual discussion with the aim of expanding the Overton window (for any and all lenses). After all, I believe such an attitude is the progenitor ingredient to puruse something as open-minded as an ERE lifestyle. This also means I'll allow opinions/posts that I wildly disagree with as long as they abide by reasoned/intelligent arguments. I am also not super-pleased with the current state of the forum when it comes to politics/gender atttiudes, but I also understand that this could easily change on its own because of emergence maybe next week, next month, or next year.
In particular, if I start cleaning house (as some have told me they'd like), I think that would be much more destructive to the ultimate goal of thinking outside the box than having to endure disagreeable political or sexist or whatever lenses for a while. I'm trying to take the long view here and in that regard, I think the underlying hardware, that is, the nature of how we discuss, is more important than whether we like whatever software is currently running on the platform.
The result is that I tend to come down much harder on posts (and posters) that drag down the level (misinformation, memes, personal attacks, ... ) than posts that are disagreeable in topic or framework.---Because the cost of not setting a limit of the thoughts one is allowed to think is that sometimes other people´s ideas is that sometimes they will fall outside one´s Overton window. Basically, I moderate for form, not content. As long as you present well, you can present anything you want.
This is because I believe that it´s a lot harder to fix stupid than it is to change opinions or mature.
I strongly believe that insofar I fix the Overton window in place and only allow sentiments in accordance with it, things would get stale, and frankly, I'd rather be annoyed than bored. Insofar I desire a particular atmosphere, I'm not optimizing for "welcoming" as much as "fair and smart". A place, where participants are willing to consider any wild idea even if and perhaps especially the ones they don´t like.
Conversely, the other way of running the forum would be to fix the Overton window but allow a larger range of immature behavior for lack of a better word. That setup, I think, defines the vast majority of online forums.
Actionable advice: To change the atmosphere or lens of the forum, there´s strength in numbers. Retreating or lurking only serve to propagate the current situation. Effectively, every time you decide not to post, it's a vote that you approve of the current atmosphere. I realize that it takes more than one person to change the tone (this is also why I can´t do it on my own even as a moderator) and so it will require some spontaneous coordination in which several people consistently push the new lens or atmosphere for a while. It works. This is, after all, how the current atmosphere was "installed". And no, the atmosphere is not changed by attacking the old one. It's changed by replacing it.
TL;DR - To create the space that you prefer... you simply have to take it by which I mean develop it. Don´t take it from someone else. It´s much like converting land by throwing seeds. Complaining about the current crop or garden (that someone else planted) won´t change anything. Planting enough seeds will.